A Boy and His Cat

Kobe Lunch (For The August Birthday People)

Aaron loves Miso soup

Nick and me 💕

Oh, Aaron 😂

cherry poke cake, of course

What a nice birthday celebration. I'm grateful for the love of family and friends.

💕💕💕

                                          

Handcrafted by Jake
a fountain pen of Kingwood wood &
a bowl of Acacia wood

Birthday Week (Saturday)

Nick turned 37 years old on Saturday. I remember well the day he was born, and I remember how he seemed to know my voice when I first talked to him, moving his head ever so slightly in my direction. These days, Nick is known for his heart of gold, and his compassion for people who are struggling in the world.  

The plan is to celebrate tomorrow with the family at Kobe Japanese Steakhouse, and today I made a Cherry Poke Cake to bring along with. 

Happiest of Birthdays, Nicker. 💙💚💛💜

Birthday Week (Friday)

Friday was a day of rest for us. We were both so tired! I mentioned that to Debbie, and she reminded me that I was now 66 ... 😂 So today we stayed home and did home things, Bruce working on his latest Singer Songwriter Challenge, and me working on my latest Jigsaw Puzzle Challenge. (This puzzle was a puzzle from Pa, and I did put it together last year, all 1,000 pieces. Will I be able to do it again now in my advanced age??? )

Bruce set up the wildlife camera that he gave me for my birthday, and we experimented with the best bird feeder to place it by. There were plenty of house finches seen, a couple of cardinals, a nuthatch, and a chickadee, but my favorite was the downey woodpecker eating on the sunflower suet feeder.

Birthday Week (Thursday)

Mona's mom passed away recently, and we went to her funeral on Thursday. It was at a little Lutheran church in the country, literally surrounded by corn fields. It was a very nice service, a traditional service with an open casket (she looked beautiful), a walking procession to the grave site, and a lunch afterwards. So hard to lose a mom. 💔 And then when we went for our walk in the evening, we noticed this stone sign on a tree at Thorpe Park. 

Birthday Week (Wednesday)

Wednesday was a day to drive up to the cabin and retrieve the boat from Farm Island Repair. When Katie heard that we were going up, she suggested that she and the boys drive up for the afternoon, too, and so that's what they did!

Pop Pop and Aaron fished off the dock, and Aaron did really well, catching mostly sunnies. Pop Pop cleaned a couple of the bigger ones so we could have a fish fry for supper, and we added a bag of frozen sunnies from the freezer, just waiting to be eaten up. When it came time to eat the fish, though, Aaron wasn't really interested...

some of Aaron's catch

Before they left for the drive home, we had a fire and roasted marshmallows. We still had a few of those huge marshmallows that Debbie brought up, so delicious.

Birthday Week (Tuesday)

As it turned out, the new roof for our house was installed on my birthday! The roofers arrived at 6:30 in the morning, and quietly began unloading their things. The shingles and dumpster had been delivered Monday evening, so everything was ready to go. It's pretty amazing that a job like this can be completed in a day, and it was a relief to finally get things done after all the planning and thinking about the best company to go with, plus making a decision on the best color shingle to use. Hard work!

Tristin didn't care for the 
noise either

Of course there was a lot of noise, and I was glad to get out of the house. Katie and the little boys treated us to a hibachi lunch at Kai's Little Sushi, and then off to their house we went for the afternoon. Bruce drove back before the roofers finished, and worked with them on adjusting the roof antenna for our TV. The guy was surprised that we were still using one, but we love our antenna! We have some streaming channels, too, but there's a lot of free channels you can watch with an antenna. And if the wifi goes out, which it actually did on Tuesday (and wasn't restored until Thursday! 😮 ), we could still watch the news. 

Aaron liked the miso soup

DJ Daniel

there they are

💕💕💕

A Gluten Free Cupcake

I made some gluten free cupcakes that were actually pretty decent tasting. The little boys don't usually seem to care much for the cake part of cupcakes, but they did love the loaded up frosting and sprinkles. It was a nice birthday. 💕

A new roof, most expensive
birthday present ever...

Birthday Week (Monday)

The last couple of years, I've wanted to walk around Lake Harriet for my birthday. Today we did that again, and even though it was kind of misty outside, there was also a nice wind blowing which made it quite comfortable. Lots of pretty things to look at along the way, and afterwords we stopped at Perkins for an early supper. Of course it was Free Pie Monday, so there will be pie to eat tonight while we watch our current series on Netflix, Sneaky Pete. French Silk Chocolate for me, Key Lime for Bruce.

we think this was a poplar tree
with cool bark

Turning 66 tomorrow! 😮

Perkins Meatloaf, it's
what's for dinner